The best turkey choke for a Winchester SX4, and the one word that stops the wrong tube fitting

How we picked

Every tube here earned its place two ways. A maker's own fit chart or product title puts it on the thread a Winchester SX4 uses, and the tube is scored on the choke rubric in our published First-Season Score — load compatibility 30%, constriction options 20%, thread fit coverage 20%, build and porting 15%, maker guidance 15%. Every number in the table below was read on a maker's own page, and the stock and size lists were re-checked on 2 November 2026. We do not pattern guns for you; what we can do is show you which tubes are rated for what, and which maker will tell you.

The SX4 problem is not fit tolerance, it is one word on a box. Winchester sells the SX4, and Carlson's sells a turkey tube filed under “Winchester / Browning Inv / Moss 500.” Those two facts look like they belong together. They do not, and buying on that assumption is the most common way an SX4 owner wastes $70 three weeks before the opener. If chokes are new to you altogether, start at the guns and loads hub or with what choke for turkey hunting.

Which thread a Winchester SX4 takes

Browning Invector Plus. You do not have to take our word for it, because the maker most likely to sell you the wrong tube prints the warning itself. On its Winchester / Browning Invector / Mossberg 500 turkey choke page, Carlson's states in capitals that the tube “DOES NOT FIT WINCHESTER SX-2, SX-3, SX-4 or SXP” and that “Winchester SX-2, SX-3, SX-4 & SXP use Browning Invector Plus.” That line was still on the page when we checked it on 2 November 2026.

Indian Creek says the same thing from the other direction. Its 12 gauge fitment table files your gun under model “#0006 — BROWNING INV +, Win SX2, SX3, SX4, SXP, Browning Gold, Silver, BPS (standard constriction .665),” and files the Mossberg 500, the Winchester 1300 and the Weatherby under a different model entirely. Patternmaster goes further and puts the gun names in the product title: “12ga Browning Invector Plus/Win SX2, SX3, SX4 Code Black Turkey 0.665 Choke Tube (5071).”

So the rule for an SX4 owner is short. A tube sold as Invector Plus is your tube, even when the word Browning sits in front of it and your shotgun says Winchester on the receiver. A tube sold as “Winchester,” “Invector” or “Win / Moss 500” is not, however much it looks like it should be.

There is a third Browning thread to know about, because it will appear in the same search results. Invector DS is the newer system on the Browning A5 and some Cynergy models, and Carlson's and Kick's both sell separate DS tubes. An SX4 is not a DS gun. If your barrel is a Browning rather than a Winchester, check which of the three names is stamped on the barrel or printed in the manual before you order anything.

The five tubes, side by side

Every value links to the maker page it came from. A dash means the maker does not publish that figure, and the score treats it as missing rather than assuming the best. Constrictions are exit diameters, not the amount of constriction: a smaller number is a tighter tube.

Why Kick's Invector Plus Gobblin' Thunder ranks first

Two things put it ahead, and neither is a pattern claim. First, the load rating. Kick's says the Gobblin' Thunder “can be safely used with lead, TSS, or other non-toxic loads” — the only rating in this lineup that covers both sides of the shell aisle. On a gun you will still be learning next spring, a tube you do not have to re-buy when you change shells is worth real money.

Second, choice. Kick's lists six exit diameters in the Invector Plus thread — 0.655, 0.665, 0.670, 0.675, 0.680 and 0.685 in — which is more than any other maker offers an SX4 owner, and more than twice what most offer. After your first session on paper you can go tighter or looser instead of shrugging. The rest of the tube is documented in unusual detail on Kick's own page: 17-4 stainless steel, 3 5/16 in overall with a 1 1/2 in ported section and 2 7/16 in inside the barrel, cut for a 0.743 in standard bore, installed and removed with your fingers and no wrench.

The honest catch is the paperwork. Kick's publishes no warranty terms at all, and the Invector Plus page states “NON-RETURNABLE: NO RETURNS OR EXCHANGES ON THIS ITEM.” Carlson's and Patternmaster both publish lifetime coverage. So measure the choke already in your barrel, compare it against the photographs and dimensions on Kick's page as the page asks you to, and order once.

One note on the tie behind it. Indian Creek's #0006 and Carlson's TSS tube both score 7.4, and we put Indian Creek second on the two things a first-season buyer actually uses: your shotgun is printed on the fit table, and there are three diameters to pattern instead of one.

Lead or TSS: the split that decides your pick

Buy the shells first, then buy the tube its maker rates for them. On this thread Carlson's splits its turkey tubes cleanly down the middle, which makes the decision unusually easy.

On the tungsten side, Carlson's TSS Turkey item 38021 is a single 0.650 in exit that Carlson's says is “optimized for Federal Premium Heavyweight TSS Turkey Loads” and works with other makers' turkey ammunition in “Smaller shot size 7-9.” If a box of TSS is already on the shelf, buy that tube and stop reading this section. Our TSS choke picks cover the tungsten lane across gauges, and TSS vs lead turkey loads covers whether the upgrade is worth it for a first season at all.

On the lead side, Carlson's Long Beard item 70140 at 0.665 in was built around one specific shell: Carlson's says it is “specially designed to produce the best patterns when shooting Winchester's New Long Beard Turkey loads.” That is a lead shell an SX4 owner can usually buy in town, which is worth more on opening week than a tungsten box that has to be ordered. Our lead-shot choke picks go wider on that lane.

Indian Creek sits on the lead side too, and more broadly: the Strike “will accommodate all lead and hybrid heavy loads with shot sizes from #2 through #10,” the widest published shot-size range on this page. For tungsten, Indian Creek steps back and tells you to check the shell maker's recommendations — honest, but no help if TSS is all you shoot. Patternmaster publishes no load rating for the 5071 tube at all, which is why its score for load compatibility is the lowest here despite the best-documented build.

Which constriction should you start with?

Tighter is not automatically better, and Carlson's says as much on its Choke Tube Information page: its chart is a starting point, with exceptions for every shotgun and load. For a 12 ga Invector Plus barrel, the published starting points look like this.

Notice how much agreement there is: three of the four rows land on 0.665 in. If you want one number and no further thinking, that is the number for an SX4, and it is the diameter Patternmaster uses for every 12 ga Code Black Turkey tube it sells. Then go shoot it, because the only diameter that matters is the one your gun and your shells like. How to pattern a turkey gun is the 40-yard routine, and the NWTF's own patterning guidance is five ways to evaluate a turkey pattern.

If your SX4 is a 20 gauge

Winchester sells the SX4 in 20 gauge as well, and the thread logic does not change: it is still Invector Plus, and the Winchester/Invector tube still will not fit. Carlson's makes exactly one 20 ga Invector Plus TSS tube, item 38023 at 0.565 in, and Kick's lists an Invector Plus version of the 20 ga Gobblin' Thunder. That is a thinner shelf than the 12 ga has, which is normal: makers build the 12 ga first.

If you are still choosing the gun rather than the tube, the gauge argument is in 20 gauge vs 12 gauge for turkey, and the 20 ga shell shelf is in best turkey loads for 20 gauge.

Fitting it without wrecking the threads

Three habits, none of them optional. Make sure the gun is unloaded and the action is open before a choke wrench comes near the muzzle. Clean the threads in the barrel and wipe the tube before it goes in — grit in a thread is how a tube seizes. And seat the tube fully: Indian Creek's instruction is to “make sure threads screw-in smoothly and that the choke is completely seated in the barrel.”

Three of the five tubes here are extended and designed to go in by hand. Kick's says its tube is “easy to install and remove with your fingers. No special wrench or tool required,” and Indian Creek says its Black Diamond tubes “require no tools and are easily hand-tightened.” Hand-tight is the specification, not a shortcut: over-torquing an extended tube is how the knurling gets chewed. The flush Carlson's tubes take the wrench that came with the gun.

One last habit for the end of the season. Take the turkey tube out, oil the threads lightly and put the factory tube back in. A tube left in a barrel through a damp summer is the one that will not come out next March.

What a tighter tube cannot fix

A choke changes the spread of the pattern. It does not change where the gun points, and on a turkey gun that is the bigger problem. An SX4 wearing a bead shoots where the rib tells it to, which is not necessarily where a gobbler's neck is at 35 yards, and no constriction on earth corrects a point of impact that is 6 in high. That is a sight problem, and it is the argument in red dot vs bead for turkey hunting.

The other thing a tube cannot fix is distance. Our how far can you shoot a turkey page lays out why the honest answer for a first season is closer than the marketing suggests, whatever your tube claims. Pattern the gun, find the yardage where your pattern still puts enough pellets in the head and neck, and hunt inside it.

And if the bird never gets to 35 yards in the first place, the tube was never the problem. Calling is, and the beginner path through it starts with box call vs mouth call.

Read the thread, not the brand

This whole page exists because of one mismatch: your receiver says Winchester and your thread is called Browning Invector Plus. Every maker here files the thread under Browning's name, and two of them print your gun's model number next to it. Search the thread name, not the gun name, and the shelf gets much smaller and much more correct.

Decide the shells before the tube

Load rating is 30% of our score because it is the one spec that can make a tube wrong rather than merely suboptimal. Kick's covers lead and tungsten. Carlson's sells one tube for tungsten (38021) and another for Winchester's Long Beard lead (70140). Indian Creek covers lead and hybrid heavy and defers on TSS. Patternmaster rates nothing. Buy the shells you can actually get locally, then buy the tube whose maker names them.

How many diameters do you want to own?

One tube and one diameter is a perfectly good first season, as long as you pattern it. But if you expect to keep tinkering, Kick's six sizes and Indian Creek's three are the only real choices on this thread, and the cheapest way to improve a pattern is usually the next diameter rather than the next brand.

Check the warranty and the return policy together

Carlson's publishes a lifetime replacement policy in plain words. Patternmaster publishes a lifetime warranty but voids it for purchases from an unauthorized marketplace seller, which is worth a careful look at who is actually shipping your tube. Indian Creek guarantees against defects with no stated length and charges a restocking fee on a wrongly chosen tube. Kick's publishes no warranty and no returns at all. For a $70-100 part, that is a real part of the price.

What to buy with it

Paper. A tube you have not patterned is a guess, and a pack of turkey targets costs less than the gas to the range. Our patterning guide has the 40-yard routine and the head-and-neck count that tells you whether the tube you just bought is the right one.